"Oh, half London, to be sure; such a quantity of tiresome relations, and so much property, and family dignity, there will be no end of all the cousins--don't you know they are just the sort of people who teem with relations?" "But who is there of the party that one knows?" replied Lady Tilney. "Oh, there are ourselves, and the Duke of Mercington, and the Boileaus, and Baskervilles, I believe; I fancy too the Duke and Duchess D'Hermanton, and some of _that_ set, are also among the _priés_, but I must go now _en qualité de cousine_, and leave my card with the Melcombs, and then I shall go on to Kitchener's, who has the resetting of the family diamonds. I am told they are magnificent; and I should so like to persuade Lord Ellersby to let mine be reset too, I have had them three years in their present form, and am so tired of them as they are--he, he, he!--well--adieu, we shall meet to-night at Lady De Chere's?" "_Avouez moi qu'elle passe la permission qu'ou a d'être bête_," observed Lady Tenderden, as she left the room. "May be so, but she is a very old friend of mine, and besides, she is perfectly _comme il faut_, and after all, that sort of thing gets on in the world just as well as talent." "Perhaps better," rejoined Lady Tilney. "_Précisement_," said the Comtesse Leinsengen, "but, _il faut que je pars, je vais voir le trousseau_, for oderwise I shall have nothing to say to Lady Baskerville, who goes vid me to-night to de Opera. _Adieu les belles, adieu._" "I wonder how she can be at the trouble of going to see that foolish _trousseau_," exclaimed Lady Tilney, as soon as she was out of hearing. "She is so _inconséquente_. Did Lady Ellersby name the Baskervilles as being among the invited?" continued Lady Tilney. "Oh yes, the Comtesse, depend upon it, has taken care they shall be asked; and my Lord is always flattered in being reckoned a requisite appendage to a woman of high rank; but he will soon find his error in depending on her smiles, for except for the gratification of the moment's vanity, she seeks no further aim, and at all times scruples not to sacrifice her _çi-devant_ friends to her new ones." "Poor Lord Baskerville," replied Lady Tilney, "was intended to be by nature _le bon enfant_, which she calls him; but he has fallen into the terrible mistake of thinking himself a _leader_ of _ton_, which gives him a ridicule that he would not otherwise have." "How well you read characters, my dear Lady Tilney! But I thought he was a _protégé_ of yours." "Oh, so he is; I like him of all things; and he is often vastly useful. One must have different characters at command to fill different parts, or else nothing that one wants would go on. But to return to the Melcombs, I do not recover from my surprise about that marriage."